Abstract
The outbreak of COVID-2019 has focused public attention on China's wildlife-related legal regimes, such as the regulatory regime for wildlife hunting and trade and the animal epidemic prevention regime, which is complex, with the Wildlife Protection Law as the core. On February 24, the standing committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) issued an emergency legal document, the Decision, which has the effect of banning wildlife consumption, guiding public awareness, and regulating the overall legal system, and directly initiates the revision of the Wildlife Protection Law. On 21 October 2020, the Wildlife Protection Law (draft amendment) was announced. Based on the Decision and the Draft, this paper believes that in future revisions of the Wildlife Protection Law the main focus should be on changing the form of state ownership, establishing a pluralistic protection system, increasing legal penalty, coordinating with other legislation, and concern for individual animal welfare.
Highlights
The outbreak of COVID-2019 has put China's wildlife protection legal system in the national and even international spotlight
Article 3 of the Wildlife Protection Law stipulates that "wildlife resources belong to the state" and Article 4 stipulates that the legal principle is to "give priority to the protection of wildlife, regulate their utilization and supervision."[1] The Wildlife Protection Law is the foundation and core of wildlife protection legal system, and it is inevitable that each specific regime will fail because of the deviation in the positioning of the law as the core
Article 1 of the Wildlife Protection Law stipulates, "This law is enacted for the purpose of protecting wildlife, saving precious and endangered wildlife, maintaining biodiversity and ecological balance, and promoting the construction of ecological civilization."[10] If we look at the text alone, such legislation should be oriented towards legal norms with conservation as the ultimate goal
Summary
The outbreak of COVID-2019 has put China's wildlife protection legal system in the national and even international spotlight. It analyzes the function and position of the Decision in the future legislative activities and proposes a holistic approach to revise the whole system by taking into account China's special conditions and the Draft. That in the Chinese legal concept, protection and utilization are not a conflicting, antagonistic relationship.[9]
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